Search results through image attractiveness

A computer-readable medium bearing computer-executable instructions which, when executed on a computing system comprising at least a processor, carry out a method for responding to a search query, the method comprising:

• receiving a search query from a computer user;
• determining a query intent of the search query;
• identifying a set of content related to the query intent, the set of content comprising at least one image;
• determining an overall score for each item of the set of content according to a determined relevance value of the item to the query intent, and wherein the overall score of the least one image is further scored according to an image attractiveness value;
• generating a search results page according to the overall scores, wherein the search results page includes the at least one image;
• and
• returning the search results page to the computer user in response to the search query.

A computing system implementing a search engine configured to respond to a search query, the computing system comprising a processor and a memory, where the processor executes instructions retrieved from the memory in responding to a search query, and wherein the computing system further comprises:

• an executable intent identifier that, in execution on the computing system, evaluates a search query received from a computer user to determine a query intent of the search query;
• an executable content retrieval component that, in execution on the computing system, identifies a set of content related to the query intent from a content store, the set of content comprising at least one image;
• an executable results ranking component that, in execution on the computing system, determines an overall score for each item of the set of content according to a determined relevance value of the item to the query intent, wherein the overall score of the least one image is further scored according to an image attractiveness value;
• and
• an executable search results page generator that, in execution on the computing system, generates a search results page according to the overall scores, wherein the search results page includes the at least one image;
• wherein the search results page is returned to the computer user in response to the search query.